In a bid to improve the experience of riding a city bus, the TTC wants to beef up service to include such upgrades as 10-minute service on 21 of its 139 bus routes beginning in the fall of next year.

The proposal, dubbed the Transit City Bus Plan, calls for improvements to be implemented by 2015 that range from more frequent service, to more express routes and vehicles that are less packed.

The 55-page plan, which goes to the commission for approval Wednesday, would see operating costs increase by $52.1 million annually by 2015. The commission expects to see $13 million in extra fare revenue, leaving $39 million to be covered by city council.

The TTC would also look to city council to provide another $76.8 million in capital funding, with the biggest item being the cost to purchase 56 extra buses to provide the faster service.

Just to upgrade to 10-minute service on the 21 key routes would add $10.1 million in annual operating costs, including paying 80 additional drivers.

It would be faster, easier and cheaper to have the buses run in dedicated bus-only lanes, but the TTC isn't advocating that, said city Councillor Adam Giambrone, who chairs the TTC.

Giambrone said existing bus lanes on Bay St. and Eglinton Ave. don't work well because of a lack of police enforcement to keep private vehicles out.

"Until we are able to figure out a better way to do the policing, whether through cameras or more on-street enforcement by Toronto police, I don't think we're looking to recommend more bus lanes at this point," he told reporters at the TTC's Davisville and Yonge headquarters.

The bus plan focuses on what the TTC can do by itself without seeking the cooperation of other agencies and the motoring public, said service planning manager Mitch Stambler.

"The implementation of more bus lanes or bus rapid transit requires a much bigger involvement on the part of the city's transportation services, and all other users of the road, and it becomes a more challenging thing to implement," Stambler said.

While the city's focus has been on subways and light rail in recent months, Giambrone said the plan recognizes that 300 million riders a year go by bus — about 60 per of the TTC's total ridership including subway and streetcar riders.

The bus plan also builds on last year's historic, $56 million-a-year boost in service, by which the TTC matched bus operations to subway hours on about 90 per cent of its routes, moved to 30-minute service throughout the city and reduced crowding by 10 per cent on some of the most packed routes.

Under the new plan, an extra 75 routes would get all-day, 20-minute service by 2013.

The city has already secured about $8 billion from senior governments to build the first three of its seven proposed Transit City streetcar lines, but there's no guarantee the TTC will have the money to boost its operations or its equipment and facilities.

The report proposes the TTC spend $41 million to install transit signal priority at the remaining 1,130 signalized city intersections that still don't have it. But that expense would be offset by a $13.7 million reduction in buses.

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